Thursday, August 30, 2007

G is for Goose is finished - and he had to get outlined because he didn't show up on my fabric, which is I think an antique white or off-white. I can never remember the names of these colours once the label comes off.

I got a nice start on Leslie's Neighbourhood RR but not enough to show yet, that will come soon I hope. My house so far looks quite a bit different than the houses she and Glenna have stitched on her piece, I hope she doesn't mind.

And I had such an exciting e-mail from Sue (Redwitch's Stitch and Bitch) that I won her blog-aversary contest and she is sending me a prize! Wow - I am totally bowled over by her generosity!!! And I will be stalking the mailman next week for my package :-D

Sunday, August 26, 2007

Sorry, I feel like I've hit a dry spell in blogging. I don't feel like I have too much exciting to post about and not too much to show stitching-wise. I have been working on my Fair and Square exchange for my partner, Carol, and I have finished up my squares, but can't show them yet. I have also finished up my exchange for the What's the Buzz exchange, but can't show that either.... so this is going to be a not very exciting post picture-wise.

However Harmien has gotten me very excited about stitching on my Carriage House Sampling Alphabet, after seeing her progress on hers on her blog: XStitch.nl. So I dug mine out of its bag, with a few litttle moths flying out with it. Darn, I realized before I could start in with the fun stuff, I had to outline a few more alphabet blocks, so it was back to 3371 for me!

Alphabet Blocks by Carriage House Samplings on 40 ct Newcastle antique white linen, stitched with a mixture of DMC and GAST

The kids are back from Zoo Camp, where they had a fantastic time! Here are a couple of pictures they brought back. The first is Nick feeding Mama Tiger a little snack:

Sunday, August 19, 2007

What a great day at Ann's annual stitching retreat! We left in the morning, anticipating getting there early and getting a good seat, only to find about 8-9 cars already there! But with Ann's new stitching room, there are lots of great seats and fantastic lighting provided by the sky lights. Lunch of course was amazing as always, as everything always brings such delicious food and its too tempting to try a little bit of everything. The dessert table was so enticing....with so much goodies and cakes, but with diabetes now, I resisted and only ate a small piece of carrot nut bread and fruit only.

It was so great to see and catch up with stitching friends that I hadn't seen for a couple of years and I was looking forwards to finally meeting my new blogging friends. Its so funny to meet people face to face that I feel I know already through their blogs!

I did get a few pictures, although not enough I realize now, as I must have taken them later in the afternoon and I have too many shadows from the skylights. Believe me, the lighting was much better in the room than what shows up in the pictures!

A not very clear picture of Kathy at the end of the table in the stitching room, with several of the ladies in Ann's Thursday afternoon stitching group.

Colleen and Marj mostly kept to the much quieter dining room with Carmen and Paula for most of the day. I didn't get a picture of several of the people who were there, including our lovely hostess, Ann (Knowledge and Needles), or Dani (Dani...Black Belt Stitching Wizard), who was always visiting at different areas of stitching groups, nor did I get a chance to meet everyone! There were over 20 people there - what an amazing group!

Of course I did pay a visit to Ann's shop, Knowledge and Needles, conveniently located next to the house, and with Anita's (ahem) encouragement only managed to fall off my stash diet a little. I did want to pick up some 25 ct fabric so I could try some over-one stitching with my super-fantastic new Dazor magnifier at hand, so I found two fat-quarters in cream and antique white. Ann had some of the new JBW patterns, these are just so sweet and too hard to resist these cute little patterns. I found a Prairie Schooler Christmas Ark pattern, that I thought I could adapt into a birth sampler, as I just found out I am about to become a great-auntie again. And 3 of us, Anita, Marg and I bought the last of Ann's Spring Fever biscornu kits. Not such a bad stash haul and actually it was only $2 over my stash budget that I had saved up, so no guilt on my part! I can climb back up on the wagon again....at least until my birthday :-D

Thursday, August 16, 2007

I got a very nice gift in the mail today ~ a very sweet biscornu from Cindy (Random Stitching Ramblings) as a PIF gift. Cindy was so sweet to note my love of purples and stitched this in a lovely variegated purple floss! I love it and it is taking a place of honour as my very first biscornu. She noted that it was the first one she had made and I was in awe of her amazing work. I have been too chicken to attempt such a thing myself! I only wish my photography skills were better!!

I have been enjoying my very quiet house, but I can admit that its actually a little too quiet for me? The first 2-3 days were great but now its eerie and even the dogs have become too quiet for me! I keep thinking I must remember this when the kids have me ready to pull my hair out and when they come home bringing in 3-4 friends a piece, expecting all to eat. Hubby and I were so bored with each other last night that when our brother-in-law dropped by with a friend, we almost jumped all over them.

So I will be very much looking forwards to Ann's (Knowledge and Needles) annual retreat this Saturday. She is expecting 30 stitchers to be there. I missed the last 2 retreats because of illness so I am very anxious to get to this one! There are going to be several other bloggers there so look for lots of pictures after this weekend!

Sadly to say though I am officially on a Stash Diet, so other than perhaps a little fabric, I don't expect to be bringing home any new stash...... :-(

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Here are my first 2 blocks done for the 12 days of Christmas SAL. So I haven't fallen behind...yet! Click on the link on my sidebar and see what some of the other ladies are doing. Some are doing the new Cranberry Christmas pattern and others have decided to do entirely different PS patterns. What a great variety!

Hubby worked hard this weekend on my sewing room, it is all freshly painted, and then he installed my cutting table and some new cabinets he had made for me to store all of my quilting/stitching stash. I spent a good part of Sunday moving everything up 2 flights of stairs and sorting through, trying to organize things. Pictures will come, once things start to look a little more organized.

Then we were off to take Kristy and Nick to Zoo Camp at Jungle Cat World for a week at teen camp which means, yes, gasp, an entire week with the house to ourselves! We celebrated last night with dinner out at hubby's favourite restaurant, he certainly deserved it after his hard work on the weekend. And then he had to make another trip out to the zoo as Nick had forgotten an extra pair of shoes for caving which they are doing today. Caving, which also means water caving, not an experience for claustrophobic me but the kids are very excited about it. Kristy has done it before and loves it. I can't imagine Nick will be able to fit his 6'2" body in a lot of these enclosed tiny spaces but....I won't think about that.

I am also stitching on my square for the Fair and Square Exchange. My partner for Round #2 is Carol. I had so many choices when it came time to find a design for her, as she loves so many styles, and although my first thought was of course to stitch a house for her, as we are in a Neighbourhood RR together. I finally decided on something and got started on the weekend. Of course I won't be showing that here although may be a peek later on.

Friday, August 10, 2007

Houses of Hawk Run Hollow by Carriage House Samplings on 40 ct Pearled Barley by Lakeside Linens

I did a little happy dancing while on vacation - I finished off House 5 of Houses of Hawk Run Hollow! And I even got started on House 6, the dreaded black house, as this block is completely filled in. I had great intentions of getting a lot accomplished, but my Prairie Schooler turkey was just too much fun to play with last week and I couldn't put him down.

Where has this week gone? This is the first day I have been able to leave my windows open and the a/c hasn't come chugging on first thing in the morning. Ahh, some fresh air, that's what it feels like! I still haven't caught up on my blog reading, and I haven't completely unpacked or caught up on my laundry yet. Well that's what weekends are for! And for some stitching too I hope!!

Oh and I finally picked out a paint colour for my sewing room - its called Seaway Mist. And wouldn't you know after looking at dozens of colours a few weeks ago, this one was the first one I picked up from Home Depot! I would post a picture but hubby made off with my paint chip when he went off to buy the paint. I think he was afraid I would change my mind or something, hmmm, like I would ever do that?

Tuesday, August 07, 2007

We're back from 2 weeks of glorious vacation! And that was 2 weeks of glorious weather at the cottage, what more could you ask for? It was very restful and absolutely what we needed ~ lots of time spent boating, visiting, soaking up the sun (even a little sunburn), enjoying our little beach, and yes, lots and lots of stitching!

And while there were LOTs of bills waiting for us at home, there were also the new charts from Prairie Schooler waiting for me too. I wish I could have gotten these before I went away!

I did start a new stitching project for my holidays....couldn't resist....its a Prairie Schooler chart, since I hadn't received the newest releases yet. This is from Book 93 called Harvest Time. I started with the last chart and I hope to do all 3 and make them into a new wallhanging, well one day anyways LOL, for my new sewing room...the colour of which is still undecided! But hubby is wanting to start painting so a decision will have to be made soon. I got more paint chip samples from Home Depot, hopefully I'll have better luck with Ralph Laurin!Harvest Time by Prairie Schooler on 18 ct Oatmeal

I am looking forwards to visiting and catching up with everyone's blogs over the next few days!